shores oceans
by highboys
Summary: Greece is a distraction, when Spain needs it most.


**Title:** shores; oceans  
**Fandom:** Axis Powers Hetalia  
**Characters:** Greece/Spain  
For **silverpawz** **aphmediterraneo**

* * *

- and, one day, he walks into the ocean and it swallows him in the darkness of the night.

* * *

**before I met you**

* * *

Take me somewhere beautiful, Antonio says. Herakles sluggishly rests his head against Antonio's back, watching the scars move with every flex of a muscle, every intake of air.

The sea is always nice, Herakles says, after a moment, and Antonio nods absently, as if considering something.

What if I-

Don't think too much, Herakles interrupts, reaching up to scratch, half-heartedly, at Antonio's skin, his nails digging into the soft flesh until he leaves crescent-shaped marks into Antonio's back. It fades, quickly, with the impermanence of a thousand other wounds, a hundred other lovers.

Your shores; my oceans. How many nights will Herakles whisper this into Antonio's bare skin, feeling it heat and cool under his touch with the lull of Herakles' fingers, the sound of waves in the distance.

Happiness should taste better than this.

* * *

**there was**

* * *

Is it so interesting?

A moment's pause, and Antonio shuts his book. Tosses it to the side. It falls, gracelessly, to the floor. Not so much, Antonio says, and I'm sorry, I didn't mean to-

It's fine, Herakles says, picking it up and dusting it off with his jacket. It's only a century old, no big deal.

Antonio laughs, but does not show much remorse. I never took you for the sentimental type. You were always so...

Herakles watches him make a few circular motions with his fingers. Waits until Antonio pounds his fist against his open palm, his eyes lighting up.

Out of it, Antonio finally offers, looking pleased with himself, and Herakles shrugs, petting the cat that brushes against his legs, purring for attention.

Antonio is the type to make mincing insults out of meaningless words. If Herakles were the type to bear grudges, then he would have kicked Antonio out a long time ago.

I'm bored, Herakles says, fingers dipping lower to the small of Antonio's back, and Antonio grins, without teeth, matching the heat of Herakles' skin, the indolence in his touch.

* * *

**nothing.**

* * *

Say that you could take someone's history, write it out in five hundred pages or less. What would you do with it, afterwards, other than to lay it bare?

Herakles would sleep and sleep, if time permitted. Perhaps find some way to pass the time in the form of sculpting, of defining the edges of each plane and the curves of each slope, and then recognizing the beauty in each crevice. Perhaps.

What about that trip? Antonio says, nudging Herakles' leg with his foot, sliding his palm along Herakles' exposed thigh.

Close your eyes, Herakles says, and hums a slow tune that lingers in Antonio's mind for hours on end, like the same sort of lullaby only Herakles could have experienced. Mothers are rare and far too few for their kind; lovers are the closest.

What would you call it? Antonio's mind hums. Incest? Wife husbandry?

Stop thinking, Herakles whispers, and Antonio pretends there's some anger in his tone, if only to find some other resemblance with another being.

* * *

**living on borrowed space and borrowed time**

* * *

And then, there is only the sea to imagine.

No stops at tourist destinations, no mention of architecture. Antonio will seat himself on an uneven plane of sand, the small consequence of sedimentations, and Herakles will watch him from his vantage point ten feet away, picking at the scraps of driftwood, at shards of tiny glass. It scrapes his nails, his fingers, like a kiss.

What are you looking for, Herakles wants to ask. When he calls Antonio's name, voice hoarse with the ache of sea salt and too much longing lodged in his throat, settling in his bones, Antonio looks at him with the kind of vacant expression he is prone to exhibit, a brief moment of open guardedness, no weakness, but no strength. The slightest smile already perfected, the small quirk of an eyebrow, the twitch of a muscle, hours and hours of restlessness and searching for impossibilities in someone else's landscape - all these Antonio finds in Herakles lands, in an old lover's geography.

I can see you, Antonio mouths, and Herakles takes a bony wrist with his own fingers, his skin sliding neatly against Antonio's as the waves curl at their feet, the smallest measure of a touch Antonio can't bear to receive from him.

But, even then -

* * *

**let's pretend we're in love**

* * *

Lonely, Antonio whimpers, fingers scrabbling for purchase against Herakles skin as Herakles grunts and pulls him closer. His mind is a mess and he can't think properly with Herakles' breath against his ear, his hand cradling his back, so he hooks his leg around Herakles' waist and grinds down lower, I'm so lonely I can't think -

He comes with twist of Herakles' fingers, and a gasp that sounds more like a sob than anything else.

* * *

**because**

* * *

There was always Lovino to think about.


End file.
